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I think we need MORE raking in the form of authentic ranking such as exit exams for each grade and subject that students must pass to pass the course. I really do think this is the fix for our education woes. Measure everyone by the same standard. Base the tests off of the standards that are supposed to be taught in each class then rank everyone. As a former engineer I would welcome a test my students had to take that tested what I'm supposed to teach instead of what they currently do which is muddy the water with stuff I teach mixed in with stuff my students should have learned years ago that they may or may not remember. If you want me to teach it then test it. If you want students to buy into their own educations test them on what I teach. I really do think it's that simple. There is nothing wrong with teaching to the test if the test is actually written using what is supposed to be taught.
I don't understand the desire to make everything a high stakes, all-or-nothing, end of year test in every subject. Doesn't matter how well you've done all year, we're going to throw that out and now you're whole life and future depends on how you do on this one test.
What do you do if a student fails the one test? Repeat the grade again? While I have no problem holding back those who don't know the material, I'm very much against punishing those who have one bad day.
There are very few things in the work world that are such high stakes. Let's just roll the dice for graduation. Snake eyes. You lose.
I don't understand the desire to make everything a high stakes, all-or-nothing, end of year test in every subject. Doesn't matter how well you've done all year, we're going to throw that out and now you're whole life and future depends on how you do on this one test.
What do you do if a student fails the one test? Repeat the grade again? While I have no problem holding back those who don't know the material, I'm very much against punishing those who have one bad day.
There are very few things in the work world that are such high stakes. Let's just roll the dice for graduation. Snake eyes. You lose.
It's simple. If it's worth writing a standard for it's worth testing. Would you buy a car with 141 design standards if we only tested 6 of them to make sure they were really addressed? That's what they do with education.
There are two things wrong with education in this country. 1) No one ensures that the standards are actually taught and 2) Students are not held responsible for learning what is taught. You solve both of these issues with end of course/subject year testing. Under our current system kids are passed on to the next grade/course regardless of whether or not they are ready. We set them up for failure when we do this and we drag the rest of the class down as the teacher tries to deal with the kids who shouldn't be there in the first place. When I reminded my principle that I have 11 students in my two geometry classes who failed algebra his response was a dismissive hand wave and to ask me "What are you doing to remediate those students?". 11 out of 48 students is HUGE. More than 20% of my students don't have the prerequisite skills to be in the class. The time I must spend trying to remediate them and control their behavior issues because they are frustrated and that frustration comes out in the form of disruptive behavior is HUGE and detracts from everyone's learning. Everyone loses. They lose because they were set up to fail. The other students lose because the class can't stay on task and I have to spend time repeating material they already know which results in less of the new material they will need for future classes being taught.
This is not the same as rolling snake eyes. Students have the entire year to prepare for the tests. What these tests would accomplish is making sure kids are not just passed on when they don't have the prerequisite skills to go on. Personally I would not use end of year tests to rank students the way SAT and ACT scores are used to rank students. I would make them pass/fail. You must pass to move on. This would ensure that holes in student's educations were plugged early and it would ensure that teachers are actually teaching the standards. I know teachers who simply ignored the change to NGSS in Michigan because no one ever checks to see what they really teach and they can always make it look like they actually teach the standards and they know it. As a former engineer I'm frustrated by the education system. If it's worth writing a standard for it's worth testing to ensure it was taught and learned otherwise why even have standards? They're more like loose guidelines. Who cares if they are taught and learned? Just pass students on to the next grade so your failure rate isn't too low so you can keep your job.
People outside of education don't get the pressure teachers are under to just pass students whether they should pass or not. End of year testing takes this decision out of the hands of the school administration and would show just how bad the problem is. I've been told I fail too many students. To keep my job I will dummy down the curriculum. I have no choice. I can either lose my job on principle or make myself look better by passing kids who shouldn't pass which is what the next teacher will do to keep the job once I'm fired. My principal doesn't get that I got dealt more lower performing students than the other teacher (he has 6 who failed algebra in 3 classes to my 11 in two). To quote my peer "You have to do what you have to do to keep your job". Never mind that on average we have no more failures than past years. I just happened to get more kids who failed algebra and shouldn't be in geometry in one class than the other teacher has in 3 classes (I have 8 in one class and 3 in the other). My school doesn't track students but because of the way AP classes and classes like Band are offered it ends up that way. I have one chemistry class that consistently has an average 10% lower than the average of my two highest courses. This happens every year as does one geometry class with 1/3 of the students having failed algebra. End of year tests that you must pass to move on would stop this.
Why have standards if you aren't going to test them? Why have requirements for passing a class if they are not being enforced? Why have graduation requirements at all. Let's just let everyone move forward and graduate on time no matter what they do. It's time to take a step backwards and start demanding that our students EARN the right to move on and graduate. This is not like rolling the dice. Students have years to prepare for graduation and to meet the requirements. If they roll snake eyes it will be on them. If a teacher isn't teaching the standards that will come out too. If you're going to give me 141 standards I'm supposed to teach somewhere along the line they should show up on a test. Unfortunately what happens when a teacher tries to teach them all is they are told they are doing a poor job because their failure rate is higher than that of the next teacher over who teaches less than half of the standards. Guess which teacher is forced to change what they teach to keep their job? NOT having end of course tests and NOT ensuring that our students are ready to move on is hurting the entire education system.
Last edited by Ivorytickler; 12-29-2016 at 08:47 AM..
Ivory, you're not responding to what I said. I did not say to ignore standards. I said a single end of course test is wrong; they should be tested along the way.
You're an engineer. Surely you know that quality cannot be tested in at the end of the line. By then it's to late to correct. And surely you also know that any test, even statistically valid ones, have a non zero percent of false results. Some kids who should fail will pass but even more tragic, some kids who should pass will fail. For any number of unrelated reasons. That is statistical reality. Are you really ok with failing kids who should pass just to claim you had an all or nothing test? Are you ok with costing them another year wasted in high school over a false test result?
I for one am not willing to sacrifice people due to random error just so education sharks can smell blood in the water.
Ivory, you're not responding to what I said. I did not say to ignore standards. I said a single end of course test is wrong; they should be tested along the way.
You're an engineer. Surely you know that quality cannot be tested in at the end of the line. By then it's to late to correct. And surely you also know that any test, even statistically valid ones, have a non zero percent of false results. Some kids who should fail will pass but even more tragic, some kids who should pass will fail. For any number of unrelated reasons. That is statistical reality. Are you really ok with failing kids who should pass just to claim you had an all or nothing test? Are you ok with costing them another year wasted in high school over a false test result?
I for one am not willing to sacrifice people due to random error just so education sharks can smell blood in the water.
I tend to agree with Ivory. I grew up taking Regents exams in New York State. That was a standard that was very clear and it mattered to students and it mattered to teachers. I remember that pass/fail rates for teachers of Regents exams in my high school were a matter of life and death for teachers. So to even teach a Regents course was something to aspire to. That's not to say that there were not abuses. I vividly remember the 3 weeks we spent taking practice (old) Regents exams in earth science. Not my view of good teaching, although Mr. Eckburg used the practice exams to thoroughly discuss questions that were most missed.
Maybe we should have a weighted GPA with multiple weightings.
A Liberal Arts weighting and a Sci/Tech weighting.
If one student gets all A's in History and Literature and C's in Math and sciences he might have the same GPA as a student with all A's in Math and Sciences and C's in the Humanities. But are they equivalent?
GPA presumes all subjects are equal regardless of the students' talents or objectives.
I tend to agree with Ivory. I grew up taking Regents exams in New York State. That was a standard that was very clear and it mattered to students and it mattered to teachers. I remember that pass/fail rates for teachers of Regents exams in my high school were a matter of life and death for teachers. So to even teach a Regents course was something to aspire to. That's not to say that there were not abuses. I vividly remember the 3 weeks we spent taking practice (old) Regents exams in earth science. Not my view of good teaching, although Mr. Eckburg used the practice exams to thoroughly discuss questions that were most missed.
So in other words, he cheated. Not that I'm disagreeing since it kind of confirms my point. But what about the students who fail just due to random error effects outside their control? A single high stakes test is a single data point. Do we really want education decisions made from a single data point?
Maybe we should have a weighted GPA with multiple weightings.
A Liberal Arts weighting and a Sci/Tech weighting.
If one student gets all A's in History and Literature and C's in Math and sciences he might have the same GPA as a student with all A's in Math and Sciences and C's in the Humanities. But are they equivalent?
GPA presumes all subjects are equal regardless of the students' talents or objectives.
psik
Who gets to decide which subjects should be weighted?
Who gets to decide which subjects should be weighted?
Who selects the books? Who decided that accounting should not be mandatory?
I only suggested an option I have never seen before.
I am one of those people that got A's in math and sciences. I could have gotten better grades in history and literature but I just didn't care. I would rather spend time on other things. The people who got straight A's in everything didn't impress me with their intelligence. They were just kids who would do whatever AUTHORITY told them. Good NAZIs.
Is that what schools and grades are really for? Producing pawns for AUTHORITY?
All of this talk about JOBS and ECONOMICS but not truly taught to serve their own economic interests very well.
psik
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